Archive | Legislative Bills

On September 6, Voters Injured At Work succeeded in an effort to secure emergency legislation for interpreters and injured workers in the state. The bill, AB 1376, responds to a state rule put in place in August. Continue Reading

The day starts with another – make that two more – bill signing ceremonies for Gov. Jerry Brown, Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez, who will be in the south state trumpeting SB 863. The bill makes major changes to California’s workers compensation system by eliminating areas that are subject to a lot of litigation, cutting costs for employers and increasing benefits to permanently injured workers. It was negotiated among labor union leaders and some of the state’s major employers, who are expected to be on hand for the signing ceremonies.

The first one is at a San Diego printing company at 9:30 a.m. Then the group heads to Burbank for a 2 p.m. signing at the Disney studios, a company that played a role in negotiating the bill.

CALLING AN AD AN AD? Political bloggers, tweeters and comment-posters may want to tune in to the Fair Political Practices Commission today. It’s taking comment on a new proposal aimed at informing the public when campaign funds are used to pay for blog posts and social media use. The idea has drawn ire from bloggers on both ends of the political spectrum.

FISHIN’ FOR TUITION California State University trustees are meeting today in Long Beach to take on some fiscal what-ifs. What if the governor’s tax initiative passes? What if it fails, and the state cuts CSU by $250 million? If voters approve Proposition 30 in November, CSU is planning to refund students the 9 percent tuition increase they are paying this semester. If it fails, a contingency plan trustees are considering today calls for increasing tuition by 5 percent in January.

Cal State trustees are also considering several new fees unrelated to the outcome of Proposition 30: $372 per unit for “super seniors” who keep taking classes even though they have enough units to graduate; $100 per unit for repeating classes; and $200 per unit for taking an extra-large course load of 17 units or more. The university estimates it could generate $35 million a year with those combined fees.

DEATH PENALTY: Under the dome, the joint Public Safety Committee will hold a 10 a.m. hearing on Proposition 34, which calls for repealing the death penalty in California and replacing it with life without parole. Opponents of the measure are holding a campaign kick-off event later in the afternoon, with Sacramento County Sheriff Scott Jones, former NFL player and crime victim advocate Kermit Alexander and San Mateo County DA Steve Wagstaffe.

Assemblyman Roger Dickinson, D-Sacramento, has introduced legislation that would give unionized state workers more workplace discipline protections and first dibs on state government work.

SEIU Local 1000 and the Union of American Physicians and Dentists support AB 1655, the “Public Employees Bill of Rights Act.” Here’s what it would do:

• Gives unionized state employees priority over outside contractors and excluded state workers to fill permanent, overtime and on-call positions.
• Sets a one-year statute of limitations for employers to take an adverse action against a state employee. (The current law allows disciplinary actions up to three years after the discovery of fraud, embezzlement or records falsification.)
• Establishes a peer review committee to provide workplace operations input.
• Guarantees that the state won’t impose “unreasonable quotas” on employees.
• Bans extra work created by vacancies, furloughs of layoffs without “fair compensation.”
• Gives priority to workplace safety and health grievances.
• Explicitly bans workplace discrimination.
• Strengthens whistleblower protections.
• Requires employers exercise “preventive and corrective” actions before administering harsher employee discipline.
• Settles grievances in favor of the employee if the employer misses contractual deadlines for response.
• Defines protections and performance and merit evaluation processes for professionally licensed employees.
• Guarantees independent legal representation for professionally licensed workers named as codefendants in litigation against their employers.

The bill language won’t be online until Tuesday. Thanks to Taryn Kinney in Dickinson’s office for faxing the author’s copy, which The State Worker (with help from Capitol Alert colleague Torey Van Oot) has posted below.

Oakland, CA (WorkersCompensation.com) – The California Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) highlights new laws that apply to California employers and take effect Jan. 1, 2012. The new laws are designed to provide protections for employees and detail requirements for new hires. Other new laws allow for employer savings in their workers’ compensation costs.

Starting on Jan. 1, 2012, California employers must provide additional information to new hires that are not exempt from overtime, are not public employees, or subject to certain collective bargaining agreements. Assembly Bill, (AB) 469 requires a written notice be provided at the time of hire that contains specified information about rate of pay, pay day designation, physical address of the employer’s main office and the name, address, and phone number of the employer’s workers’ compensation carrier. A template of the written notice is available from the California Labor Commissioner at www.dir.ca.gov/dlse.

Under the new requirements of AB 243, farm labor contractors are now required to include, in the itemized information on employee pay statements, the name and address of the legal entity (usually a grower) that secured the services of the farm labor contractor.

Payment rules for dispensing medical equipment and drugs, including compounded drugs, are prescribed by AB 378. This bill also reduces inappropriate financial incentives in order to lowers workers’ compensation costs by by prohibiting referral of a patient to a pharmacy in which the physician has financial interest.

AB 1168 lowers workers’ compensation costs by establishing a fee schedule for vocational experts. This will prohibit vocational experts from being paid fees in excess of what is allowed under the schedule.

Senate Bill 923 by Senator Kevin de León could be brought up on the State Assembly Floor later this week. This bill would direct the DWC Administrative Director to adopt the RBRVS fee schedule for all treatment services and medical-legal diagnostic studies at a revenue-neutral rate of 115% of California Medicare. This would represent a $500 million a year cost shift of revenues from medical specialists to primary care physicians.

We need your help to defeat this terrible legislation!

PLEASE SEND A FAX TODAY to your State Assembly Member in Sacramento, urging him/her to vote “no” on SB 923. You can find your Assembly Member by following this link. Then go to the Find My District link on the left-hand side and enter your address.

Also send FAXes to the Assembly leadership:

Speaker John Pérez (916) 319-2146 FAX

Republican Leader Hon. Connie Conway (916) 319-2134 FAX

Majority Floor Leader Hon. Charles Calderon (916) 319-2158 FAX

Assistant Republican Floor Leader Hon. Curt Hagman (916) 319-2160 FAX

Following are some points to include in your FAXes as to why Senate Bill 923 (de León) is bad for injured workers:

Cutting payments to medical specialists by 20% to 48% will discourage them from treating and evaluating injured workers, thereby denying workers the medical benefits to which they are entitled under California law.

Low income and high risk occupations such as farm workers, construction workers, restaurant workers, freight handlers, teachers, and maintenance workers typically sustain more serious injuries that require medical care from specialists, not general practitioners.

If workers are denied access to care from medical specialists such as orthopedic surgeons, internists, neurologists, rehabilitation physicians, anesthesiologists, radiologists, etc., and forced to obtain their treatment from general practitioners, it will delay their healing and return to productive, income-producing work.

If injured workers cannot obtain diagnostic tests and measurements such as EMGs, MRIs, and echocardiograms, they may not be able to prove the full extent of their impairment, thereby short-changing their permanent disability benefits. Employers will also suffer due to an inability to prove apportionment.

Injured workers deserve an increase in their permanent disability benefits that were cut in 2004, but they shouldn’t be forced to give up their medical benefits in return. Realistically, any potential increase in permanent disability benefits could never offset the loss of the medical benefits if SB 923 becomes law.

AB 783, authored by Assemblymember Mary Hayashi (D-Hayward), slipped by public notice over the holiday weekend as news broke about a massive federal bust involving nine states and the arrests of more than a hundred physicians, physical therapists and other health care practitioners alleged to have engaged in the largest Medicare scam in history.